Alignment during Preproject Planning

Abstract

Many projects suffer when project participants are in disagreement as to the proper success emphasis or goals for the project. These differences in success emphasis are a result of poor team alignment. Alignment can be defined as the condition where appropriate project participants are working within acceptable tolerances to develop and meet a uniformly defined and understood set of project objectives. This paper outlines a recent exploratory research study aimed at identifying the important characteristics of alignment during the preproject phase of industrial capital projects. Included in this paper are a description of alignment, its relationship to the project team and corporate project approach, and its key drivers. Through workshops, interviews and project-specific data collection, 10 critical alignment issues were identified. A composite alignment effort index demonstrated a positive, measurable effect on the performance measure of a sample of 20 capital projects. Conclusions and implications for project management professionals are given based on the findings.